In counseling against an Adrian Gonzalez trade, I’ve cited the idea that the Padres can’t trade him during season ticket renewal season because otherwise an already depressed and apathetic fan base may get even more turned off, if that’s even possible.
Well, turns out that the fan base may not be as depressed and apathetic as I thought, because as MLB.com’s Corey Brock reports, the team passed 71 percent on their season ticket renewals last week. They renewed only 55 percent all of last offseason. In addition, they’ve sold more new season tickets so far than all of last year.
None of which is to say that the Padres should go out and deal Gonzalez. It does show, however, that (a) there’s a stronger fan base in San Diego than a lot of us realized; and (b) baseball’s relative resistance to the overall gloomy economic situation may be even more pronounced than we thought.